I'm Late

"I'm late, I'm late for a very important date.
No time to say hello, goodbye.
I'm late, I'm late, I'm LATE!!!"

That (the song from Alice in Wonderland as performed by the white rabbit) was all that churned through my mind this morning as I rode into the shop. The alarm went off at 5:30 and I just laid there... "Do I get up, do I stay in bed? I bet it is cold out like it was last night. I could so easily roll back over and go to sleep." I finally get up, drawing a mental map of where everything I need is located in my apt and checking off the mental checklist of cycling goodies as I grab them. Leg warmer - check, shoe covers - check, towel - check, name tag - check, and so on.

6:46am and I'm finally rolling out the door. I texted Arther to see if anyone was riding but I got no reply. I prayed that they would linger a while at the shop or at least ride through the park, passing me if they left before I got there. My bag kept shifting, I struggled to get my gloves on while in motion, wanted to stop for a coffee and continued to pray I wouldn't miss the ride. As it happens the commuter goddesses were smiling on me today and Arther and Joe passed me as I was climbing the first hill out of Cleveland Park. YES, I get a good ride in!!! They circled back and met me, I dropped my stuff at the shop and we were off. I hopped on Arther's wheel as is my usual as of late.

We cruised through the park and then into downtown, passing all the riders from the Miracle Hill Ride, there didn't appear to be a lot of them. A few stragglers thought they were supposed to follow us but we informed them otherwise. We went out to Furman & TR, hitting the usual back roads. While in TR a few things hit me on a straight, flat portion where a quickish pace is typically set. My legs felt good and bad all at the same time Arther can set a brutal pace in his little ring. But it hits me... I'm in my little ring too, keeping up and staying where I should :)

We get out to some hills and I take it easy. My legs started burning towards the end of the ride. Not really the I can't go on burn, just the it hurts like hell, I'm working pretty hard burn. We pass the front side of Paris Mtn and head back down towards the shop. This is my favorite part of the ride. Flat, slightly downhill at the end at the turn. Of course my computer still isn't working so I have no idea how fast I was going but I was going pretty freak'n fast for my ability. I got kinda perturbed at the turn b/c I had to slow down b/c there was a Mercedes SUV in front of me taken their sweet time. But an amazing ting happened. I was able to catch there draft and stay on for a short while. I couldn't believe I was actually staying with them... I had a huge grin from ear to ear so I probably looked like a dweeb and I think I might have even freaked the guy driving out though he didn't speed off like a prick or anything. I just blew up and had to fall off so he stayed the same speed and I slowed down. But I worked like hell to get to the end of the road alone, though Arther finally caught me. Joking when he caught up that I was being motor paced.

We came back to the shop, showered, ate some breakfast and started the day. The day of course being wide open as we have been extremely busy and we had a rep in today teaching us how to body scan to fit people to their bike. I'm on my second vault of the day, I just ate lunch at 4:20pm and I am ready to go home and crash. I wanted to do a moderate ride tomorrow but my knees were hurting today and I'm not sure if I should just take tomorrow off completely or what. My total this week is around 181 miles and it feels pretty good but my body is in this weird limbo between getting stronger on the bike and being exhausted all the time. I need more time on my mtb, I haven't ridden it since Stump Jump. I'm half jonesn, half scared I'm gonna be face planting from poor handling skills next time I do ride. Oh well, at least there is beer... RIGHT??

Until next time, pedal like a GIRL!!